She can turn even the most reluctant — or, in her words, dormant — reader into a student who can’t put their books down. With talent and passion like that, it’s a benefit to children that she abandoned her career as an accountant to become a grade six language arts and social studies teacher.

On this edition of Just One More Book!!, follow Mark as his audio recorder captures forgiveness, education and pop-culture, how Jewish books have evolved and become exciting for young readers.

Segment 1: April Halprin Wayland is the author New Year at the Pier, a book about forgiveness which is rooted in the the Tashlich ceremony of the Jewish New Year celebrations of Rosh Hashana. This segment includes April reading the beginning and end of her book, New Year at the Pier.

Segment 2: Librarian Toby Rossner shares her approach to creating educational programs about universal values using picture books including Chicken Man, a book about someone who made the most out of any job he did.

Segment 3: Ann Abrams is a musical librarian who serenades us with her own songs and sings a musical parody using a popular song for which she rewrote the lyrics — both to help get children excited about Jewish children’s books.

This episode includes two brief excerpts of Mark’s session on using social media to raise awareness of great Jewish literature using social media, presented at AJL09.

Also included is an interview with David Mazor, Founder and Executive Director of Reader to Reader — a non-profit organization that distributes books to schools and libraries in need. Reader to Reader honoured author Norton Juster for his generosity and passion in promoting literacy.

According to pen.org, PEN is an association of writers working to advance literature, defend free expression and foster international literary fellowship. There are chapters all over the world and not long ago, we connected with author Fran Manushkin (on JOMB), regarding an event of the New York PEN group of which she is co-chair.

A member of the group audio recorded the March 16, 2009 presentation by Jason Low of Lee and Low Books (on JOMB) and we are lucky to include excerpts of Mr. Low’s talk — anecdotes of the origins of Lee and Low, the amazing story behind some of their award winning books and insight into the term “multicultural”.

On this edition of Just One More Book!!, Mark speaks with Flying Horse Farms Camp Director W. Patrick Smith, and author Sara Lewis Holmes about building Flying Horse Farms, spectacularly average experiences and the role of books at a camp for children with serious illnesses.

It’s 2009, now. Kyle is 18 and a freshman in college, Brady is 16 and was at school when I called in response to an email they’d sent about the BestBuy @15 Challenge, which, in conjunction with GenV Youth Venture, was giving away money to youth changemakers.

As of today (January 16, 2009), My Own Book has distributed 17,311 books. Listen to this phone conversation find out how the @15 Challenge will help the foundation distribute another 8,000 books to people who need them.

Long before Mark turned thirty-eight, his vision of a librarian was that of a stiff, grey-haired woman with horned-rimmed glasses and a bun who shushed people. Now, he sees that librarians are increasingly younger than he and they’ve embraced some incredible new technologies to spread a love of reading and to promote their craft.

Elizabeth Bird, or Betsy Bird, is one of a new generation of librarians. She has achieved a lot very early in her career including sitting on the Newbery award committee in 2006 and, following the success of Fuse #8, her own blog about children’s books, has become a blogger for the web edition of the popular print magazine School Library Journal. Betsy’s also been known to produce episodes of her Fuse#8 podcast. [NOTE: Betsy’s Fuse #8 blog site is only used for podcasts since she became a blogger for School Library Journal]

The Children’s Book Bank of Toronto, Canada is a charitable organization designed to support children’s literacy by providing free books and literacy support to children in lower income neighbourhoods. We learned about it from our good friend and podcaster, Sage Tyrtle, in an email she sent us offering to help record an interview with founder Kim Beatty. We managed to convince her to do more than that.

On this edition of Just One More Book!!, correspondent Sage Tyrtle of the QN Podcast introduces us to The Children’s Book Bank.

By the way, Sage’s QN podcast is definitely for adults, not children, and frequently includes strong language and political views.

Perhaps because of the dedicated children’s picture book art galleries there has been a rise in dedicated children’s picture book art sections in traditional galleries and we keep learning about special events for children’s picture book artists. Anyway, it seems that children’s picture book art is becoming increasingly recognized and respected.

We were recently contacted by the Chemers Gallery (Chemer’s Gallery Blog) in Tustin, California to inform us of their 17th annual Children’s Book Illustration Show taking place from December 6 through 20, 2008, with a special event for the show opening taking place from 1-5pm on the 6th.

Our guest on this edition of Just One More Book!! is Karen Raab, owner of the Chemers Gallery, who tells us more about their exciting event which benefits Orange County Ronald McDonald House.

It’s probably safe to say that most people, even when holding one in their hand, don’t consider all of the work and the people involved in creating a children’s picture book. Behind the names of the authors illustrators, within and beyond the names of the publishing houses are the often overlooked people we call agents.

On this edition of Just One More Book!!, we turn the spotlight on Rebecca Sherman, an agent with Writers House LLC, who tells us a bit about her job as an agent and shares stories about some of her clients.

On Saturday, October 4, 2008, the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators held an event in Ottawa, Canada that focused on the relationship between children’s book creators and agents. The day included presentations, group discussions and private meetings with agents to review manuscripts.

On November 16, The Richard Michelson Gallery will host it’s 19th annual Children’s Illustration Show. The event which is open to the public coincides with the launch of a new exhibit of children’s picture book art and attracts some of the biggest names in the industry. And this year, Just One More Book is going to be there.

On this edition of Just One More Book!!, author, poet and gallery owner Richard Michelson walks Mark through the origins of the Children’s Illustration Show, who will be there this year and what people who attend can expect.

This discussion sets up a series of audio and video podcasts we expect to publish that will cover the Just One More Book!! experience as we travel through Connecticut on our way to the Richard Michelson Gallery’s 19th annual Children’s Illustration Show in Northampton Massachusetts — the unofficial centre of the children’s book industry.